Total pages in book: 48
Estimated words: 45414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 227(@200wpm)___ 182(@250wpm)___ 151(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 45414 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 227(@200wpm)___ 182(@250wpm)___ 151(@300wpm)
“I was going to say it was damn presumptuous of you, saying it’s okay when you don’t know me. But honestly, I think that was just an excuse to get my butt over here.”
“Why would you need an excuse?”
His smirk twitches and turns into a frown, his eyes flitting over me. I wish I could reach behind those startling eyes and into his mind, gain access to his thoughts and learn what he thinks, what he feels when he gazes at me.
“Stop changing the subject,” he says, with a teasing note in his voice. “You were going to tell me who this Jerry motherfucker is.”
I want to press on. Excuse, to see me? So you wanted to see me? So you needed to see me?
But I can tell he’s not going to quit until I give him what he wants.
That’s fine by me.
I just wish he wanted more than to talk about Jerry freaking Schmidt.
“Jerry’s a sick pervert I was nice to once upon a time.” I sigh, squeezing my hands together tightly. “When I was sixteen, the orphanage arranged for us to go to a summer camp.”
I see his face twitch at the word orphanage, but he doesn’t press me for any more details. That’s good because I don’t want to think about the ocean and the screaming and the guilt, the guilt that never quits, never takes a break.
“It was pretty good, you know, getting away for the summer. I’ve always been pretty shy, or maybe just comfortable in my own company… I don’t know. But anyway, there was this one staff member there, Jerry. He was in charge of all the events for the camp and he arranged for me to have access to the art room outside of scheduled hours.”
I break off, sipping water so I can delay the inevitable.
Zack looks at me like nobody else ever has. His complete attention is on me, leaning forward as though he could close the short distance between us with one feral charge.
And then he’d grab my legs hard, squeezing so my sex tingled with even more imperative want, and then, and then…
But I can’t let my mind skip off to silly places.
“He asked me to paint him, and I agreed, thinking it was going to be fun. But then he…”
“It’s okay,” Zack says, voice fierce. “Whatever happened, it wasn’t your fault.”
“It was so sick. He exposed himself and started taunting me with it, with himself. He said I should paint that. I was so scared, I didn’t know what to do. So I did what he said. I painted him… like that. And then afterward he started to cry and he said he loved me, that he’d loved me the second I arrived at the camp. He said we were going to get married and be together forever. It was so sick, so wrong. I hated it and I tried my best to avoid him for the rest of the camp.”
“But it didn’t end with the camp.” Zack’s words tremble, shiver like they might boil up and erupt out of him.
I shake my head. “He started popping up outside my school. I ignored him. And then he started leaving me notes. I ignored them too. Finally, he got angry and started leaving horrible things in my locker, even in my bedroom at the orphanage. When I turned eighteen, I moved to the other side of the city, into a house share.”
“But he found you.”
I paw at my cheeks, at the tears which never do any good but insist on springing up anyway. “He always finds me. Last time, I left my apartment in the middle of the night and left a phony forwarding address. I was hoping to throw him off.”
Zack clenches his fists, his temples pulsing visibly. It’s like there’s a current of lava running beneath the surface of his skin, burning him up from the inside.
“What did the police say?” he asks, barely restraining his voice.
“They helped me get a restraining order on him. But they also warned me that it would be difficult for me to prosecute him because it was only me and him in the room at the camp. Believe it or not, he’s built up a really good reputation amongst the camp, the parents, the other kids. He only shows his true self when it’s just the two of us.”
“Scumbag,” Zack snarls. “Fucking mongrel. I should’ve choked him out when I had the chance.”
I warn myself not to read too much into his words.
He’s obviously just angry at the situation, that a man would do something so twisted to a child, and not specifically because it’s me.
He doesn’t care about me.
“Now I don’t know what I’m going to do.”
I can’t help it. A sob cracks through my words, tears springing to my eyes.